Nvidia Driver Deep Dive Confirms(?) 3060, 3060 Ti, and 3070 Ti Revisions!

Following the release of Nvidia’s latest graphics card drivers earlier this week, while it was certainly interesting from the point of view of it adding support for the new 4090 as well as optimising DirectX 12 performance for (apparently) all RTX GPUs, it seems that under the surface, there was also something potentially a lot more interesting to be found.

Yes, following a report via Videocardz, and in what represents the latest piece of information to get added to the ever-mounting pile, it would appear that Nvidia is indeed set to announce the launch of newly revised 30XX graphics cards with the 3060, 3060 Ti, and even the 3070 Ti all seemingly set to get a revamped design!

Nvidia (Sort of) Confirms the 3060, 3060 Ti, and 3070 Ti Revisions!

It should be noted that information surrounding these revisions is hardly new. In fact, rumours first began to appear on the subject back in May/June with the 3060, 3060 Ti, and 3070 Ti all being touted to be getting revised designs. – And this hasn’t been idle speculation either. Earlier this month a retailer listed the 3060 Ti with a new GDDR6X memory specification, and more recently we also saw information suggesting that the 3060 was also set to get transitioned onto GDDR6X as well.

What has Nvidia’s latest driver actually revealed though? Well, a deep dive into the actual driver support list has found three new listings that were not there before (and come as an addition to the existing 3060, 3060 Ti, and 3070 Ti drivers)

• NVIDIA_DEV.2207 = “NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti” – On a new upgraded GA102 chipset
• NVIDIA_DEV.24C9 = “NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti – Retained as a new additional entry on the GA104 chipset
• NVIDIA_DEV.2544 = “NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 – Retained as a new additional entryon the GA106 chipset

Put simply, Nvidia has three new drivers available for seemingly three new revisions.

What Do We Think?

Nvidia has already said that they plan to maintain support for the 30XX graphics cards for much longer than usual. Why? Well, this predominantly comes down to three key reasons (with a little reading between the lines).

Firstly Team Green isn’t releasing its lower-tier 40XX GPUs until early to mid-2023. Secondly, the performance uplift we’ve already seen with the 4090 suggests that similar levels of uplift will be seen in lower-tier models (which, if they landed now, would hardly make the 30XX platform tempting for consumers). And the third point is likely the most substantial. Thanks to overordering based on the apparent hope that the crypto-boom would last forever, Nvidia has masses of 30XX chipsets they still need to move on, and, with people currently showing more than a little hesitation in buying a new graphics card… Well, they’ve got to try something and it seems revised and upgraded 3060, 3060 Ti, and 3070 Ti’s is their answer.

Admittedly though, when information on the 3070 Ti first leaked, it grabbed my attention. Particularly since it was understood to be moving to 16GB of VRAM (I always considered its base 8GB to be rather disappointing). – If this is, therefore, upgraded and revised, this might ultimately end up being the GPU I finally retire my 1080 Ti for.

What do you think though? – Let us know in the comments!